


Some Old-Fashioned Book Learning

by wynnesome



Category: Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Gen, Gift Fic, Librarians, Libraries, Magic, Revenge, Schadenfreude, Victor von Doom is ruthlessly kind, comeuppance, made-up ethnic slur, making real life feel better by fixing it in fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-15
Updated: 2019-11-15
Packaged: 2021-01-31 02:16:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21438541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wynnesome/pseuds/wynnesome
Summary: Two junior librarians at the Latverian National Library are being ill-treated by bosses and customers alike.When it becomes too unbearable, one of them doesn't know what else to do. So even though she is sure it will be fruitless, she makes a terrifying appeal for aid -- to Doom himself!
Comments: 10
Kudos: 13





	Some Old-Fashioned Book Learning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sparklefingers](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sparklefingers/gifts).

> Written for the lovely and sweet [Sparklefingers](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sparklefingers) when she came home from an awful day at work, feeling terrible after watching her fellow librarian be mistreated in a manner similar to what's portrayed in the story. I wanted very much to fix it, and fic was the only way I could.
> 
> **Content Note:**  
The RL situation, sadly, involved racial insults, and the story alludes to that. A character is belittled for being an immigrant, and one made-up racial insult is stated. The national origin being disparaged is a fictional one.

The line of petitioners moves forward. It is one of the more junior librarians from the Latverian National Library who next makes her obeisance, then rises when cued, to stand before Doom. Visibly quaking, she begins a stumbling account of her grievance. 

Haltingly, tremulously, she speaks. If not for the magically enhanced acoustics of the throne room, she would be nearly incomprehensible -- but petrifying as it may be, she is unable to let this tale remain any longer untold. This is no singular event, she is compelled to make known. Just the newest in a long series of such slights. 

One of her co-workers had resisted a patron's outrageous demands, including his bald refusal to make payment of his late-return penalties, she explains, then falters, seeming to grow more terrified as her story unfolds.

Showing far less than his customary degree of impatience, Doom prompts her to continue. _Hmmm_, he interjects, when she describes how the belligerent customer had complained to a supervising member of staff. And _hmmmm_ again, when she angrily recounts the way the head librarian had upheld none of their policies, but kowtowed to the customer, after wrathfully attacking her co-worker, spewing insults to her intelligence that escalated into slurs upon her parentage.

Despite the effort it costs, and despite her trepidation, the gentle, book-loving librarian builds in momentum till she is spitting the words, full of venom. "...and th-then he c-c-called her a--" She hisses the final epithet: "--a b-bastard Symk-karian!" As soon as it's out, she's biting her cheek, rocking on her feet, arms hugged round her chest, clearly expecting to be struck down for her audacity in repeating such a vile profanity.

She breaks into a stream of abject apologies and prostrates herself, but the overlord waves it off, waves her up, with the pronouncement,"You are dismissed; this is more than sufficient for Doom."

She exits as hurriedly as legbones of jelly will carry her. She's been allowed to live, but of course Doom cares nothing about the plight of a pair of junior librarians.

The next week, the obnoxious reader returns to demand more books. He's as rude and insulting as before. He threatens the same librarian for telling him he can't be moved to the top of the waiting list for the book he wants, and then, as before, complains up the chain. And once again, the senior librarian responds by heaping shame upon the junior, who was just doing her job, minding the royal charter, and making sure that the library's books are equally available to all citizens.

And her fellow, who was so affected as to petition to Doom, can once again only stand by, holding the lid on steam-pressured anger that makes her want to do something desperate and rash, and reminds her that she and her co-workers are of no importance that would merit intervention.

But just then, as if summoned by a thought, who should march into the library but the sovereign himself. He strides up to the circulation desk, setting down two massive tomes bound in green leather with bronze and iron hasps, announcing, "These are overdue. Doom has come to pay his fines."

Whereupon the librarian at the desk, the whistle-blower bearing witness, the sycophantic superior, and the boorish book-borrower, all tremble and go to their knees till Doom impatiently motions everyone up. "Doom has many matters of consequence to oversee. Tally the fines."

The beleaguered desk-worker brings up the appropriate records and starts to name a total, but the boss immediately jumps in with a rebuke. "You fool, Lord Doom does not pay *library fines!*" He backs away from looming over the browbeaten junior, and bows down to Doom. "My lord, this imbecile is nothing but a low-class immigrant, unfitting to bear glory to Latveria, and whose employment here will end within the hour. Your lordship owes not a penny. We are surpassingly honored to--"

Doom cuts him off with a swipe of the hand through the air that clearly carries magical force, for the head of the head librarian snaps back as if slapped.  
  
"It is you who are the cretin here," he bellows, and then points to the presumptuous patron. "As are you!"

He turns his attention back to each of the two junior librarians in turn, giving each the briefest of nods. He is, after all, their king. Then, far more delicately than any of them would believe possible for one wearing such heavy gauntlets, plucks several coins from an ornate purse hanging from his belt, and spins them through his gleaming metal-clad fingers to land in a row atop the counter. 

"Doom believes this will clear his debt."

At this point, every person in the room is standing frozen. The monarch breaks the ice, speaking in a softer tone, though it is no less a command.

"Go on. Count it."

With shaking hands, the embattled librarian counts the coins, stuttering out the total, and looking utterly awed as she confirms, "Y-yes, Lord Doom, this is p-perfectly correct..." She holds out a receipt, the paper flapping so badly it would seem to be blown by a localized gale.

Gravely, Doom reaches toward the receipt, stills it in the air with the green-tinged flick of a finger, grasps it carefully, and tucks it back into the same purse from whence the coins came. He steps back and addresses the room once more.

"Indeed. This is a library, is it not? And as such, Doom insists that all things be done _by the book_." He seems to grow several inches taller, becoming, with an almost imperceptible shift of posture, a towering menace.

"Doom expects that we are now on the same page." Green light swirls, and where head librarian and swelled-headed customer moments ago stood, two brass-bound books, looking remarkably similar to the ones Doom had carried in, thunk heavily to the floor.

With a glint in his metal-framed eye and a tilt of his ever-masked head that could almost be taken to suggest a wink, the ruler of Latveria turns and sweeps away toward the door, tossing his parting words and a supremely imperious hand-wave over his shoulder -- because he is, after all, their lord and king.

"By royal decree, these books are banned. Burn them."

And he is gone.


End file.
